Exercise 52: Hacking and Improving Your Server

The final exercise consists of three videos. The first video is a lecture on how to hack your server and attempt to destroy it. In the video, I show you a great many tools and tricks for breaking protocols, using my own implementation to demonstrate flaws in the design. This video is fun, and if you've been following along with your own code, you can compete with me to see who made the more robust server.

The second video then demonstrates how I'd add improvements to the server. You should attempt your own improvements first before watching this video, and then see if your improvements are similar to mine.

The third and final video teaches you how to make further improvements and design decisions in the project. It covers everything I'd think about to complete the project and refine it. Typically, to complete a project, I'd do the following:

• Get it online and accessible to people.

• Document it and improve the usability to make sure that the documents are easy to read.

• Do as much test coverage as possible.

• Improve any corner cases and add defenses against any attacks that I can find.

The second video demonstrates each of these and explains how you can do them yourself.